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April 1, 1999
Choosing New Math Software
by Cheryl Oakes
I'd like to tell you about the new math software I'm using this year.
When I choose new software for our school, I look to see how well it will integrate with our curriculum, the Maine Educational Assessments, and the Maine Learning Results, as well as how easy it is for students and staff to use and how appealing it will be to students. This year I found a winner in MathKeys from Houghton Mifflin. I was so impressed with one volume that I purchased the entire series.
What about MathKeys met my criteria? The entire series spoke to our school's math curriculum and our secured skills at each grade level. It will prepare students to meet the standards of the Maine Educational Assessments. The scope and sequence chart in each teacher manual is easy to read, and the manual is designed to be used with other math programs-space is included for a teacher to enter complementary math activities into his or her scope and sequence chart.
When I first started classes in the fall, I began to take students into the program and showed them how to run the controls in the software program. Marlu, the kangaroo, is an intriguing speaking marsupial who guides the students through such activities as naming shapes, reading numbers, reading numerical equations, and even reading answers that students write on the notepad. The notepad, in fact, is one reason why I purchased the program! Students can keyboard information into the program once they work on a problem. As part of our Maine Educational Assessments, students not only solve a problem but also describe why they chose to solve the problem the way they did. This notepad is an integral part of demonstrating to students how language arts and math are integrated-and how they must be able to articulate their work.
It has been just a few months since I introduced our elementary students to the MathKeys series, and it remains a program of choice. One little girl who has a hard time counting spent 25 minutes in the Whole Numbers part of the series listening to Marlu and pointing to the numbers 1 through 100. She was excited about finally having "someone" to play with and listen to her as she practiced counting.
Today, the first and second graders finished up their project making patterns with shape blocks and asked if they could go into the MathKeys program. Half of the class chose to play the matching game in the Geometry part of the series. Other students chose to practice adding and subtracting objects in the Whole Numbers series.
I can say with confidence that this is the best purchase I made for the school this year. When more than half the students choose to use the MathKeys for free explore time, I am glad for the purchase. When many students ask me at recess what we will be doing in the lab and they cheer when I answer "MathKeys," I know I made the right purchase!
E-mail: Cheryl Oakes
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